Then, I posted photos of my earrings on Facebook. They were a huge hit- all of these earrings sold within about 2 weeks:

Then, things started expanding. I was making earrings left and right. I loved making earrings, and now, every time I made a pair, I felt just a little closer to my grandma.

My business started out small: a line of handmade earrings. I spend hours designing the logo until it was perfect, and then i printed out several sheets of earring holders, where I cut each one out, absolutely destroyed my hand trying to punch holes in too many pieces of paper at once, and where I used tacks to poke holes in the paper for the earrings to go through. Not exactly the most efficient means of production, but it worked for me!

Day 1: I started this blog after I had created my own line of homemade products called Inspired By Marcella. The story behind the name of my brand is that it's named after my grandma Marcella who passed away in September 2014. I take after my grandma in so many different ways, it's incredible. She taught me how to sew, how to find the best deals around town, and taught me many crafting tips. She's the reason why I am the avid crafter I am today and when she passed, I didn't know how to honor her memory. I couldn't find the words to say goodbye, I couldn't even really talk about it, I was devastated. But then, I came up with the perfect way to honor her and everything she loved, and that was by creating a line of homemade products that would be named after her. I didn't care if my tiny tiny attempt at a business would ever flourish, but I just wanted people to know her name and what she stood for. Her name was Marcella Tveit and she stood for all things homemade!